Saints Row 2 is a very fun game; it even tries to help you get through the main story, just so you can have more fun elsewhere in its urban vastness. Equipped with everything from a revolver to a samurai sword, you shoot, hack, explode and destroy just about anything that gets in your way. So please bear with me, I’ve just been arrested.

After the traumatic experience of your last outing, at the end of the original Saints Row, you wake up in a prison hospital bed, ready for your new face to be unveiled, which is a clever way to force character creation upon a player. When the doctors and guards leave the room, the patient next to you encourages you to leave the facility, and you don’t need telling twice. Now I don’t know about you, but I think prisoners should be handcuffed and watched at all times. Then, one truly epic gun battle later, with many police officers, cars, boats, and helicopters destroyed, you are ready to take control of the Row again. It was far too easy to escape the prison island with your adolescent new acquaintance armed to the teeth, but then you are a Saint.

Change is something that happens over time, so it’s not too surprising to see that the urban landscape you once ruled is now under new management, and the name of the Saints is just a passing phrase in a rap song. People don’t respect them anymore. But you’re out, and you’re free, and you will regain their respect. The incompetence of the police is just about the only thing that lets you get away with this task.

In your absence three other gangs have cropped up dividing your territory; each of them guided by the invisible hand of Ultor, the real bosses of the city who have an image of being whiter than white. Therefore, believe it or not, your waves of crime and the accumulation of certain fugitives and substances, with the addition of your own private army, transform you into the game’s ‘good guys’ – well, sort of; which then justifies the want to break your friends out of jail, and destroy the other gangs for creating this corrupt and sinful society.

Driving is a key aspect of this urban traveller. You have the ability to drive anything which goes more than 80MPH, and sometimes less, but you also have to contend with other road users. I know that doesn’t sound like much but when you witness the appalling driving of the general public in Saints Row you wonder how they managed to acquire their licences. Luckily, however, their poor driving does hide yours quite well. Your driving also worsens when you’re made to shoot and drive; although this frustrated me to no end, I think it adds realism to this otherwise, hopefully, unrealistic video game.

Admittedly, this game is perhaps the most fun I’ve had in an urban sandbox in a long while. It’s easy to get along with, the premise is simple (you shot things and they die), and the whole thing is one giant parody. However, it’s not all pimps and hos. One feature of the game, namely the respect bar, annoyed me beyond belief. It’s a good feature which limits the speed at which you progress through the game’s story, and in order for you to fill it up you have to complete rounds upon rounds of mini games and possible side-quests, and that just got tedious. I found myself doing a load of these little excursions just so I could play a lot more story, though the respect bar always managed to dip below full when something good was about to happen.

I’m glad to say that, despite the frustrating bombardment of the respect bar, Saints Row 2 was a tremendously fun game. It was also overly easy and made you crave for more storyline like some junkie when you were running low on respect. Though, like in any game, the fun has to end at some point, after all, there are only so many times you can ragdoll civilians into the air, and get Rick-Rolled by your own radio, though will the fun continue with Saints Row the Third in November?